Re: Problems with N900 USB port becoming broken / loose and resulting warranty & repair issues
 

from Engadget:

Update: Mark Squires, head of social media at Nokia, dropped by our comments with an update. In short, Nokia is looking into the matter and anyone who experiences the issue should be covered by local Nokia customer care assuming that the N900 hasn't been mistreated.

Congratulations guys !!!

Re: Problems with N900 USB port becoming broken / loose and resulting warranty & repair issues
 

Wiggly IS worrisome.

As for self repairs, not easy. Please see my blog articles for details.

Re: Problems with N900 USB port becoming broken / loose and resulting warranty & repair issues
 

probably not uptodate but I found this
http://www.nkmobile.i12.com/servcentre.html

Re: Problems with N900 USB port becoming broken / loose and resulting warranty & repair issues
 

Let's hope that everything goes fine. But now it looks good. I´m not convinced until people here report that they have gotten repaired/replaced devices.

Re: Problems with N900 USB port becoming broken / loose and resulting warranty & repair issues
 

Indeed - the proof of the pudding is in the eating, as they say. It'll be all too easy to just claim that the phones were "mistreated", but I suspect the appearance of this sort of message on sites like engadget has acted as a wake-up call to Nokia. Nowadays it's very easy for a company/product's reputation to get ruined by public protest on these sort of sites, so Nokia need to show they're making an effort and not shirking their responsibilities.

Re: Problems with N900 USB port becoming broken / loose and resulting warranty & repair issues
 

Texrat- Read your blog article again, interesting read.

After closer inspection what I find is that the external usb connector base is wiggly (due it not fitting snugly on phone's male connector). Inspecting the phone usb's metallic adapter with a pencil tip it appears to be fine and no wiggles there. As other readers of your blog pointed out, I cringe every time I use the usb connector. Guess I will just have to live with it.

I am seeing the instances of phone not charging to be due to the OS.

Re: Problems with N900 USB port becoming broken / loose and resulting warranty & repair issues
 

I just hope everyone appreciates what I've done here. Drawing so much attention to this issue has probably screwed any chance I had at rejoining the company (and championing this stuff from the inside as I used to). : /

Re: Problems with N900 USB port becoming broken / loose and resulting warranty & repair issues
 

Looks like there's been some positive developments, well done Nokia for moving the issue forward and well done everyone here for sticking together and forcing their hand. I'm a bit worried about the comment in Nokia's statement saying "under certain circumstances" it can be detached - the only circumstances is charging the device! But I suspect that is in there for liability reasons, ie. they don't want to accept complete liability publicly. To me I'm not that worried about blame, we all know that the issue is a design one, just as long as there's no problems with those affected getting their handset fixed or replaced under warranty.

Hopefully there will be also be an internal review of the matter - perhaps a few people on the inside will learn some lessons about feeding pre-production feedback back to the design room, quality assurance, or engaging with customer problems quicker...

Re: Problems with N900 USB port becoming broken / loose and resulting warranty & repair issues
 

I think they mean that it's not happening to everyone - there's people who've had the issue after 6 days, and others (like myself) who've been plugging this thing in several times every day for two and a half months now, with no sign of any problems. That would suggest there's some manufacturing flaw that's leading to this (either affecting particular batches, or just affecting a given percentage of phones), rather than it being a flat-out design issue. Or it could just be that there's a bell-curve on failure times, and the rest of us have this to look forward to.

Re: Problems with N900 USB port becoming broken / loose and resulting warranty & repair issues
 

I can see this as design and/or manufacturing flaw depending on circumstances.

IF at some point the problem of copper lands detaching from the PCB surface was corrected, that's a manufacturing issue. The connectors are not likely to break free from the copper where they are soldered.

However, I am still convinced the best overall solution, especially to be on the safe side, would be to go to a through-hole mount. That eases the onus on manufacturing process and widens the tolerance band.